


Stairways Of Speaking

by NicoGenesisNivangelion



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997), Final Fantasy VII Remake (Video Game 2020)
Genre: Ableism, Character Development, Explicit Language, Friendship, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-11
Updated: 2021-02-11
Packaged: 2021-03-17 15:02:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29352411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NicoGenesisNivangelion/pseuds/NicoGenesisNivangelion
Summary: In the daunting stairwell of Shinra Headquarters, Tifa Lockhart has a slip of the tongue that puts her comrades well-off.Based-on an infamous bit of dialogue from the original FFVII. The natural trigger warnings for hateful language apply. 'Should still be a bit of fun though
Kudos: 6





	Stairways Of Speaking

Another rounded corner reveals another flight of stairs, identical in its drab greyness. She wasn't sure if the bland repetition was preferable to the gaudy art-deca paltries of Shinra HQ's showier fronts of this massive building, though perhaps the blur of uncharacterized, practical utility would allow her a bit of runners' meditation, to slip into a zen dissociation that'd make the taxing trek less interminable.

"It's... it's not one'a them endless stairways, ya think?" a haggard voice hefted out from its speaker's heavy chest. He was a few flights down, and his voice weak, but the echo of the steely, corkscrewed stairwell was helpful to those ends. So much for aligning her chakras...

"Just come on!" a familiar voice between the two of them, only fairing a touch better, responded before she had to.

 _"'An endless stairwell,'"_ Tifa mentally grumbled. She was practically built for this sort of endurance test - self-made, really - but there was a tinge of truth betrayed by Barrett's histrionics. The salty smell of sweat was creeping-in.

Another rounded corner, another flight of stairs, the same as the last... how many had it been? She didn't know. Cloud couldn't have kept track, and Barrett, massive, protein-packed Barrett with his bulky metal arm cannon probably didn't even have a good head about his own self at this point. 

_"'Endless stairwell,'"_ her inner monologue loitered on those words, partially out of aggravation, but also because it was still better than dwelling on the task at hand. Her clothes and hair were matted to her sticky body. Maybe books would help? _"'One would have to imagine Sisyphus happy.' Fat chance..."_

Whatever the case for Sisyphus, Camus wouldn't have to imagine Cloud or Barrett's moods, neither did Tifa, not that she wanted to. She honed-in on the handrail at a constant height infront of her, turning with the stairs. A trace point. Maybe that'd help her zone-out? She'd try it.

"But tell me," Barrett huffed, almost whining, his hazy voice amplified, "these stairs... are these stairs ever gonna end?"

"I dunno! Ask the stairs!" Tifa finally snapped.

"I don't think the stairs are talking," Cloud's attempted stoicism wavered in his voice with wobbly steps.

Tifa took in a perhaps deeper breath than needed. Foregoing the handrail - too immediate and corporeal for the moment's primal devices - her mind defaulted back to books.

 _"'Ankles hurt,"_ mostly books, _"... but 'scarcely any passion without struggle'..."_

Passionately enough, Barrett had begun singing, of all things.

"Another day  
Another struggle  
Climbing stairs..."

He couldn't quite finish his triumphant stanza before his composure wavered into more whingy groveling.

"Climbing stairs... is so much trouble...," the man sounded absolutely ready to cry.

"Just say you can't hack it," Cloud managed a jape between covertly sucking in air. Tifa knew it.

"I'll hack you!" Barrett retorted, like a brat a third his goddamn age.

Tifa's vision tinged red, pulsing with her accelerated heartbeat. She slowed her pace, her better, practiced goddamn pace, for a shout,

"Would you stop acting like a retard and climb!?" 

She forgot the expulsion of tension almost immediately and carried on with determination, the sound of her boots plodding up the stairs, the damn, endless stairs.

ONLY her boots, she quickly realized, coming to a stop. Had those two, bickering like children, finally collapsed? She turned and trodded back down a flight.

"Guys?" 

She found the two of them at a dead stop, Cloud knelt against his knees and Barrett propped against the rail. Both seemed transfixed on her however.

"What's wrong?" worry trumped her agitation, tired as her emotions were.

A one-sided pregnancy silenced the air. Tifa realized there was some kind of intent in her comrades' stares. AVALANCHE's leader spoke.

"Girl, did you just say...?" 

The bollocksed redness drained from her face.

"Oh..., Oh!" she practically jumped.

"Wow," Cloud huffed, managing to cross his arms.

"No, no, no!" she was suddenly more animated, raised hands pleading her case.

"That was NOT cool!" Barrett jabbed his cannon at her, as he did when making a point. "If I ever catch you talkin' like that around my Marlene..."

"Guys, I-!" Tifa's exacerbation didn't help in finding her words here. "I didn't mean that."

"Even in SOLDIER we had a course in Political Correctness," Cloud flatly stated, arms still crossed. "'The discipline to fight, the decency to be polite.'"

"Ol' Shinra ain't much for slogans, huh?" Barrett quipped.

"Look," she sharply sighed. "We're all tired."

"Well, we ain't all throwing around words like-" Barrett began.

"Y-you're one to talk!" Tifa stamped a foot. Barrett's potty mouth was notorious 

"I hate to say it," Cloud reeled the bickering in, "but he's got a point here, Tifa."

"Yeah!" Barrett added, helpfully.

Tifa closed her eyes, taking a deep, deep breath. She was indeed on the backfoot here.

"Okay, okay," she found her words. "Look, I... I'm from Nibelheim. We grow up without a lot of, well, tact for these kinds of things."

"Oh ho ho!" Barrett sneered. "I get it, 'heritage not hate,' is it?"

"NO!" Tifa balked. "I didn't mean-"

"I'm from Nibelheim too," Cloud started, but was suddenly taken by a subtle wince, prompting a slow hand against his temple.

"Listen, Tifa," Barrett stood properly, "You gotta think before you speak."

"Really!?" Tifa blurted out. "I'm getting this from you, of all people!?"

"He didn't say _that,_ " Cloud grimaced, still favoring his head.

Tifa's shoulders slumped. They were insufferable, but they were ultimately right.

"I'm sorry," she said, tiredly but sincerely. "I... I've learned a lot in these last five minutes. I understand now that I am not above using words could be hurtful in ways I didn't intend. And... and I will carry on in a more conscious way from now on."

Barrett nodded softly. Cloud was mostly impenetrable, but didn't protest.

"Alright," Barrett offered, sounding brighter. "Now, I think we got some stairs' ass to kick, and a flower girl to save!"

"Mh." Cloud nodded.

Tifa clenched her fists.

"Right. Let's go!"

-

Professor Hojo's lab, such as it was, like the stairwell stretched far beyond the presentable pomp of Shinra HQ's inviting hallows and was lost to the darkness of an unbridled madman's circumstance. Twisted metals and leaking tubes intersected and bisected portions of what was once humanity or nature, mutilated and morphed beyond recognition, blurred somewhere between chimera and uncanny horror in countless numbers. The sprawling tapestry of scarlet-stained rust beneath a sickly green Mako glow was scored by crackling electronics, squelching bleeps, and Hojo's ear-scraping laughter.

"Ahahaha!" he cackled. "Are you enjoying your new roommate, cetra?"

Aerith Gainsborough sat curled against the far end of what was essentially an egg-shaped pod. Til recently, she'd occupied it alone as a central specimen, though recently the mad doctor enclosed her with another; The red, snarling beast collared at the other end. Whether its eyes were enraged or hungry was difficult for even Aerith to discern.

"You and Red XIII here shall...," Hojo had to stop to giggle to himself, "consumate my greatest creation!"

Aerith's eyes went wide.

"Hold on!" She shouted to his overlooking control panel. "Me... a-and this d-dog!?"

Hojo only laughed.

Aerith resigned her gaze to the beast. It rocked back and forth on muscular legs, deep jagged tattoos of a cold scientific beauracracy were practically embossed beyond its fur and into the discolored flesh. Its citrine eyes burned against her own. She sat. Seemingly helpless.

"How the fuck would this even work anyway!?" her mind indignantly raced.

Suddenly, a crash at the lab's metal door disrupted the proceedings, before a familiar motley crew stormed into the warped laboratory.

"What!?" Hojo exclaimed.

Aerith excitedly pressed herself to the glass.

"Cloud!" She exclaimed.

"Aerith, don't worry!" he responded.

"We're here for you!" Tifa added.

Aerith had to smile.

"You came for me...," a warmth throughout her was evident. "I'm so happy to see you fags!"

The three of them deflated.

"There's gonna be a looong simenar when we rebuild the base," Barrett shook his head

**Author's Note:**

> If it makes this at all better, I am disabled myself, and married to a queer person, to satisfy the individualized neoliberal postures we play-at with these kinds of dialogues. Regardless, I was surprised no one had taken an easy jab at Tifa's antiquated verbiage there so I figured I might as well.


End file.
